Genesis 24:12

Summary

The verse opens Abraham's servant's prayer, invoking Yehovah as the God of his master Abraham and asking for two things: that events be arranged favorably for him "this day," and that chesed ("covenant loyalty") be shown toward his master Abraham.

Key words

• hakreh ("make happen", H7136A) — hiphil (causative) imperative: literally "cause to meet/occur," asking Yehovah to actively bring about a favorable encounter, not merely to allow one.
• na' ("please", H4994) — interjection softening the imperative into a polite request.
• chesed ("covenant loyalty", H2617A) — masculine singular noun; the object requested in the second half of the prayer, denoting loyal, faithful action rather than a specific emotion.
• 'adoni ("my master", H0113 + H9020) — construct noun with 1st-person suffix, repeated twice (lines 5 and 19), anchoring the request to the servant's relationship with Abraham.
• panai ("before me", H6440L + H9020) — plural construct noun with suffix, forming the idiom "before me," the target of the caused event in hakreh...le-fanai.

What the text says

The verse contains two parallel imperative clauses joined by va ("and", H9002), both directed at Yehovah ("O Yehovah", H3068G), identified as 'elohei 'adoni Avraham ("the God of my master Abraham", H0430G construct chain). The first imperative, hakreh-na' le-fanai ha-yom ("make happen, please, before me, this day"), uses the hiphil stem of the verb, which is causative in force — the servant is not asking simply for something to happen, but for Yehovah to actively cause an event to occur "before" him, i.e., in his presence or path, restricted to "this day" (ha-yom, H3117G with definite article H9009).

The second imperative, va-'aseh chesed 'im 'adoni Avraham ("and do covenant loyalty with my master Abraham"), shifts the beneficiary from the speaker himself to Abraham. The preposition 'im ("with", H5973A) links the noun chesed to Abraham specifically, so the loyal action requested is oriented toward Abraham's household or purposes, even though it is the servant who is speaking and acting on Abraham's behalf. The double repetition of 'adoni Avraham ("my master Abraham") in construct form (lines 4-7 and 19-21) frames the entire prayer around the servant's subordinate relationship to Abraham.

Differences between versions

The LXX renders chesed (H2617A) with Greek eleos ("mercy"), a term the Vulgate follows with Latin misericordia ("mercy/compassion"), while the Hebrew chesed denotes covenant loyalty rather than an emotional disposition. The LXX also renders hakreh-na' ("make happen, please") as euodoson ("prosper, make my way successful"), and the Vulgate uses occurre ("come to meet, encounter"), both diverging from the causative "make an encounter occur" sense carried by the Hebrew hiphil form.